The Astronomical Society of Malta is inviting the public to observe a meteor shower from L-Ahrax tal-Mellieha today from 11 p.m. when a lecture will given to those present near the chapel to introduce the night sky and explain what is expected to be seen.

Telescopes will also be set up by society members for public use.

Saviour Grech, public relations officer of the Astronomical Society, explained to The Times how a meteor shower is formed: "As night settles this evening our planet silently plunges through the orbit of the comet Swift-Tuttle, encountering debris left over by the comet each time it approaches the sun, every 130 years. This debris rams into the upper atmosphere at speeds of 60 kilometres per second, causing the air to ionise and shed bright streaks of light as the grain sized particles vaporise. This is what we see as meteors or shooting stars. This meteor shower has been observed for a long time and is known as the Perseid Meteor Shower or Dmugh Ta' San Lawrenz (St Lawrence's tears) in Maltese.

"The point in the sky, the Radiant, where these meteors if traced back seem to originate, lies in the constellation of Perseus and, hence, the name of the meteor shower, the Perseids.

"This year is a favourable year for this meteor shower. The light from a waning crescent moon rising at 00.43 will not interfere much with the meteor shower. Every 12 years this shower becomes stronger than average and 2004 is one of the favoured years. This is due to the effect that the planet Jupiter, which orbits the sun every 12 years , has on the meteor stream.

"The passage of the massive planet pulls the meteoroids closer to the sun and the core of the stream may be shifted closer to earth, resulting in more meteors being observed. Predictions cannot be accurate but the normal rate of the meteors from midnight to dawn is 60 per hour and, hopefully, this year there will be more," Mr Grech said.